Young father killed in motorbike crash

Westminster Coroner's Court heard on Wednesday that Mr Qadir met up with his friend Ayaz Saleem at around 10pm on March 15.

They planned to ride their motorbikes from Harrow Road along the A40 up to Hanger Lane and back home again.

Mr Saleem had been riding motorbikes for around two years, Mr Qadir was relatively inexperienced.

Mr Saleem said: "He had recently purchased his bike and he wanted me to look at it.

"He was quite excited."

They travelled slowly on their westbound journey due to heavy traffic, but the road was much clearer as they returned eastbound.

The speed limit on the stretch of road is normally 40mph, but the week before, it had been lowered to 30mph due to road works.

Mr Saleem said: "He knew he was an inexperienced driver.

"When there were twists and turns in the road, he was going very cautiously, but then the road goes very straight and I think he took the chance to pick up the pace.

"I approximately was doing 40 to 45mph, he was going faster than me, about 55 or 60mph.

"One main reason I think this happened is that the bike he was riding was a very powerful bike.

"I don't think he was aware of how quickly he was going."

Shortly after the Northern Roundabout in North Kensington, the road bends round to the left just as the street lights come to an end, leaving the road in relative darkness.

Joanne Tasker, a taxi driver who witnessed the incident, said: "I thought he had hit the curve of the central reservation and that made his handlebars wobble, and he lost control."

She went to his rescue, blocking one lane with her taxi, but he was already dead.

A post mortem showed he died of multiple injuries.

PC Peter Traylor, who investigated the collision, said: "Everything points to the fact that he approached this bend in the road perhaps not as he would have liked.

"He has applied a lot of braking, but doing that makes the bike want to stand upright."

"For someone who is not very experienced in riding, I imagine it to be quite frightening."

He added: "We've had a few accidents on the A40 but not in this particular area."

Coroner Dr Fiona Wilcox said she would consider at a later date whether to use her powers to ask experts to see whether the lighting could be improved, to reduce the chance of further accidents.

She said: "There's a possibility that he may have braked because he could not see, because the lighting changed, but I accept the evidence of PC Traylor that the most pertinent fact was his inexperience."

She recorded a verdict of accidental death.